"...So the last time Scott Walker did something like this, it is desperation to get rid of union employees, he overestimated how much money it would save, and allowed for a foreign based butt vodka **94** person in charge of city hall.

Woo hoo, that's Wisconsin's new governor. That's where he comes from.

The play book here is clear: The priority is to get rid of the unions, to break them up. The pretext to do that is financial, but it is clear that it is just a pretext.

The unions at the center of this fight offered to the governor, they said they would essentially give him all the financial concessions he said he wanted. But he said no to that. He doesn't want the financial concessions. He wants to strip them of their union rights or he wants nothing.

Finances are just a pretext.

Among the most expensive benefit package, the state pays for any union employees, are the ones for the unions that supported Walker when he ran for governor. Also happen to be the only ones exempted from his union stripping plan. If this was really about money, those would be the first ones on the chopping block, but it is not all about money.

Finances are just a pretext.

In the midst of the supposed budget deficit emergency that makes necessary this dramatic anti-union bill, the governor supported adding about $140 million to the state's deficit, when he passed a bunch of tax cuts without paying for them.

Finances are just a pretext.

When governor Chris Christie of New Jersey announces he needs to do the same because of his budget crisis, he is expected to announce it tomorrow, and when John Kasich of Ohio moves to do it in his state because of budget crisis, it will be a pretext in those cases, too.

Republicans understand that the business interests that support them have always wanted to get rid of unions, as it has always been and as it will always be. But more directly, Republicans understand sources of Democratic political power, and they understand sources of Democratic political power well enough to be focused across the country on how they can destroy those institutions. Corporations support Republicans. They made donations 93% Republican. But the people who cash paychecks instead of sign them, the people that work for companies instead of own the companies, actual humans instead of conglomerates, labor unions, those groups tend to support Democratic causes.

Here again, at the top ten big money contributors in last year's elections, seven of the top ten are right wing. The only three that are not are unions.

Republicans understand enough about the sources of Democratic political power to want to destroy the institutions that make it possible for democrats to compete in elections. The question is whether or not Democrats understand the sources of their political power well enough to defend those institutions against Republican attacks.

Republicans, ideologically speaking, like to talk smack about the government. Government is the problem.

Ronald Reagan: "Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is the problem."

"Government is the problem." That's always the great awkwardness at the heart of Republicans campaigning for political office. If you don't like government so much, if you think that government is the problem, why do you want to be in charge of it?

But there are two things that Republicans really like about having government power.

One is the opportunity to take things government does and give them to private companies that do it instead. (Hello you there in the coconut bra.) The other thing they have passion for using public policy to attack and dismantle institutions that support Democrats electorally.

In case it wasn't crystal clear enough that's what's going on in Wisconsin, that that's what explains why 70,000 are in the streets of Madison this weekend, in case it wasn't clear enough, when the Republicans in Wisconsin announced today what they're going to do while the Democrats are gone and out of state, denying the senate the quorum needed to vote on the union busting thing, guess what the Republicans are going to do while the Democrats are away? Guess what they are going to do next?

A bill to make it harder to register to vote in Wisconsin.

You know, weirdly, we used this last week as an example of the kinds of issues that Republicans do this on. As an example, the way they use public policy for partisan ends, to benefit their own party and hurt Democrats, registering new voters has long been a great source of Democratic electoral strength.

Why is that?

Because young voters, and people that haven't voted before, do tend to vote Democratic.

So if Republicans can make it hard to register to vote, they can take away one of the ways that Democrats win in elections.

If you make it harder to register to vote, you make it harder for Democrats to win elections.

Republicans understand what institutions help Democrats win elections and they are using public policy to dismantle those things, for partisan purposes. So while they are waiting to destroy the unions in say Wisconsin, in the meantime, while they are waiting to do that, they will use their time to destroy voter registration drives.

Republicans understand Democrats well enough to know what to attack in order to weaken Democrats. The question now is do Democrats understand their own institutions and their own strengths well enough to know that they ought to be defending them...."

"When your city is French in origin, and your Mayor and Governor are Democrats, and those most affected by this natural disaster are Black, don't expect much help from Bush." -- Left of Y'all (and the link works now too! )

Zookie, there are a couple of things underlying events that Maddow doesn't go into. One is that Walker has made it clear that he is happy to destroy the economy of Wisconsin and the future of the Republican Party of Wisconsin for the ideological purposes of the corporate interests that bought him. He knows he will be a one-term governor (if that) and will never be elected to anything again, so whatever the deal is that he has cut will be good.

The other thing is why the Democratic senators will stay away unless they can pick up three Republican votes. While the quorum rule only applies to money bills, the Republicans have enough votes to ram through anything they want and, unless a few Republican senators are willing to stand up to Walker, they will ram through anything they want. But there is, I am told, a serious question under Wisconsin law whether any law passed without a quorum is valid.

Finally, Walker has screwed the pooch. He is betting the future of the Wisconsin Republican Party that there will never be another Democratic victory in Wisconsin. We shall see.

Zookie, there are a couple of things underlying events that Maddow doesn't go into. One is that Walker has made it clear that he is happy to destroy the economy of Wisconsin and the future of the Republican Party of Wisconsin for the ideological purposes of the corporate interests that bought him. He knows he will be a one-term governor (if that) and will never be elected to anything again, so whatever the deal is that he has cut will be good.

Too true. And very, very, sad.

Meanwhile, guess who is doing a classic case of "voice of Jacob, hand of Esau" up in Wisconsin? Ta-da, it's the Koch Brothers!

Logged

"When your city is French in origin, and your Mayor and Governor are Democrats, and those most affected by this natural disaster are Black, don't expect much help from Bush." -- Left of Y'all (and the link works now too! )

Zookie - I watched that episode of Maddow. It was, if nothing else, very eye opening. Not that I didn't believe what Walker was doing had any underlying motives.

I could post charts and graphs that show how the workers he's going after average the same salary as a high school dropout, or pictures of all the firefighters (their unions aren't on the chopping block) standing out there with the hundreds of thousands in solidarity. In WI, only 1% of the population makes over 300k per year. WTF is this guy doing?

I do not understand why this mockery of the democratic process continues. Wait, I take that back - I do know why . They have agreed to the pay cuts, the increase in contribution to their pensions and their health care. Still, no compromise. Today, Scott has started threatening "pink slips going out as soon as next week". The other one was, "200,000 kids cut from Badgercare". They're also cracking down on the Dr.'s signing notes to excuse the teachers.

Alas, the state of WI voted this college dropout in. Again, I DIDN'T. I have loved living in WI - brutal winters and all - since 2002. I don't want to see this place end up like my home state of Florida. And I fear this will happen .

What is it with Midwestern Republicans? Much as they slip over it, the Koch family name is German and is pronounced "Cock"; there's John Boner, and in another thread SamV brought up Harry Baals, the former Republican mayor of Fort Wayne...

And these are the people who insist on referring incorrectly to the "Democrat" Party.

We've been asking ourselves lately "Will the Muslim Brotherhood take over Egypt?" Now, in America, we're asking "Will the Education Brotherhood take over Wisconsin?" What Republicans are fighting is paying 99.8% of teachers' pensions to the tune of 3x the average non-government worker versus the proposed 95%, and likewise fighting paying 95% of their healthcare benefits versus the proposed 88%. Check the news, folks—the Education Brotherhood is taking over Wisconsin, and they'd like to take it elsewhere. The Education Brotherhood, which is merely a branch of the Government Unions' Brotherhood, has already shut down public schools for several days now, with no end in sight, and yet they claim only to care about how well "the chi1dren" are doing.

Think about this: by shutting down the schools, they are robbing Madison inner-city chi1dren of precious school days that would help make America more competitive. They're robbing these young skulls-full-of-mush of their opportunity to be exposed to their patented leftist propaganda. On top of that, look what they are doing to working mothers who can't afford to pay for somebody to watch their kids! Did you ever think of that?

In many cases, schools exist to get the kids out of the house during the day, and even to feed them 3 meals a day! This is what the current system of liberalism in public schools has done in the name of "the chi1dren". So what about these moms (and dads)? What are they supposed to do while all this upheaval goes on? You've got parents deciding between earning money at their minimum wage jobs for food or the safety of their inner-city children, and that's just the start of the effects of the "Gang of 14" Wisconsin senators scared to death of the Education Brotherhood who are derelicting their responsibilities by protesting the moderate changes in the system by the Republicans.

The Education Brotherhood has got these Democrat state senators cowed. They hightailed it for the border at the first sign of trouble! Need I remind you of those two times that Texas state Democrats fled the scene—and those Democrats lost both times. What we're facing here is an actual government shutdown, and the State-Controlled Media is forced to report this shutdown—and they're blaming Republicans (just like they want to blame Congressional Republicans in March). Contrary to liberal popular belief, it is not Republicans grinding government to a halt, but Democrats who refuse to let the machine of government operate.

Here's the dirty little secret the Democrats and their teachers' union buddies don't want you to know. From the September 22, 2004 edition of the Washington Times comes a report on Madison, Wisconsin teachers: nearly 1/3 of public-school teachers in that city had their own kids in private schools, and it's likely increased in the six years since. The Washington Times also reported then that nationwide, public-school teachers were nearly twice as likely as other parents to have their kids in private schools. Of course, private schools aren't exactly CHEAP. It blows the myth out of the water of underpaid, underprivileged teachers (don't forget their vaunted tenure), and it puts the light of truth on the quality of education they themselves believe they provide, and beyond that, it shows how specious their arguments really are against paying a (more)-fair share of what they receive in pensions and healthcare.

"So what?" you say. "Why is this a national issue? If you're not paying for it in Wisconsin, why should you care?"

"The federal government gave $669.6 million to the public schools in Wisconsin in fiscal 2008, according to the Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). That is more than 20 times as much as the $30 million that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is trying to save in the current fiscal year by asking state employees, including teachers, to pay for a fraction of the cost of their own pension packages and health-insurance premiums."

So, in essence, we're ALL subsidizing the Wisconsin teachers' unions and their salaries and benefits. This is national taxpayer money we're discussing here. Everybody in America is getting socked to the tune of $2 per man, woman, and chi1d per year to pay for these pensions and benefits. All that Scott Walker is trying to do is to get these people to pay a fraction more in the costs, to return collective bargaining only to wages, and to prevent wages from rising more than the rate of inflation unless a state referendum approves it!

$30 million against $669.6 million. This isn't even barely a dent in public education funding for this fiscal year, and yet there is caterwauling all across the left over the extreme "sacrifices" they're having to make. Consider this: people in Wisconsin who are OUT OF WORK are paying taxes on their unemployment checks to fund salaries and benefits totaling an average of $90,000 per teacher. Benefits for these people are three times the private-sector average, and yet it is the private-sector employees that pay the taxes that fund the teachers who are the ones called greedy SOBs. Taken another way, these unions are demanding that taxpayers pay 99.8% of their pensions in perpetuity, and 95% of their healthcare packages in perpetuity. This is unsustainable as is, and these figures would only go down to 95% and 88% funding for pensions and healthcare, respectively, if this Wisconsin bill were enacted. We are not asking these people to chop off an arm and a leg.

Oh, and just as a note to those people who think a quorum of 20 is required for all bills in the Wisconsin legislature? That's only for spending bills. A simple majority is all that's needed for non-spending legislation. What the unions don't know is that the Republicans could simply take the union restructuring language OUT of the spending bill and just pass that all by itself. Done. Finis. Fait accompli. The spending would come later when the Democrats are dragged back by their teeth and nails to prevent a fiscal government shutdown that automatically furloughs all those protesting teachers—without pay—which is a sight worse than the FAKE DOCTOR'S NOTES THAT GIVE THEM PAID LEAVE OF ABSENCES TO PROTEST.

But I digress! This is going to get done, with or without Democrats, with or without spending measures required. Public-sector unions ARE DONE as they have been constituted in Wisconsin, ironically (or not) the state with the longest-tenured collective bargaining laws. This will spread to other states as well. Elections have consequences. We won, you lost.